Researchers at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, Russia, have shed light on how some of the genes react to chronic stress by studying zebrafish.
Zebrafish are increasingly being used to model chronic stress, thanks to the presence of two receptors associated with stress in the brain shared with humans but not found in mice, and also their ease of genetic manipulation.
The zebrafish test for chronic stress complements the studies using mice for anxiety research.
In the study, published in Nature Scientific Reports, zebrafish were put under chronic unpredictable stress for five weeks, resulting in an anxiety-like disorder that saw the same gene changes as seen in humans, and could be improved by administering a common antidepressant.